


widow’s walk (i’ll wait for you)

by fenwitch



Category: Six of Crows - Fandom, Six of Crows Series - Leigh Bardugo
Genre: Angst, F/M, Kaz is touch repulsed but also touch starved, One Shot, Post-Book 2: Crooked Kingdom, Prohibition AU, Unresolved Emotional Tension, Yearning, did i mention angst and yearning?, gray-ace Kaz
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-03
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:34:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23985385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fenwitch/pseuds/fenwitch
Summary: When Inej returns from the sea one year later, Ketterdam is under Prohibition, and Kaz is running a new racket.
Relationships: Kaz Brekker/Inej Ghafa
Comments: 4
Kudos: 84





	widow’s walk (i’ll wait for you)

Inej slips through the window to Kaz’s room in the Slat one night.

Kaz is bent over the desk, writing, the cap of a pen poised between his lips. He finishes his note and caps the pen, turning to The Wraith.

“I heard you were back in town.” His voice is charcoal dragged over paper.

“Only for a short while,” replies Inej, leaning against the wall. Her hair is cut short and sharp beneath her chin.

Kaz nods. “Different hair,” he remarks.

“Different city,” says Inej. “No more liquor on the streets.”

“Plenty running under them, if you know the right places,” Kaz says, standing up. He opens a drawer in his desk and takes out a bottle and glass. He unstoppers it and pours in some amber liquid, handing it to Inej.

“Tea?” She crooks a dark brow.

“Something like that,” Kaz replies, mouth quirking. A new scar curves into the top of his lip, just shy of his cupid’s bow. He pours a dram for himself and raises his glass.

“To Ghezen’s blessing,” he says, “and the Wraith’s return. If only for a short while.”

Inej raises her glass and then downs the liquid in one shot. When she lowers it she finds Kaz looking at her mouth hard eyes soft. She begins to feel a warmth spread in her chest, downwards. It’s the tea.

“Good brew?” Kaz asks.

She nods. “You start appreciating things that warm you up, after being at sea,” says Inej. She circles around the desk, hand trailing along the edge.

“There’s more where that came from,” says Kaz. “I’m heading out to a place tonight. Checking up on things. You can join, if you have the time.” He tightens his tie and picks up a grey double-breasted blazer, slipping it over his shoulders.

Inej grabs his crow-headed cane from the corner and tosses it to him. “After you,” she says with a small grin. Kaz’s eyes dance darkly. He straightens out the lines of his blazer and opens the door.

“Let’s go.”

* * *

Ketterdam is quiet and chilly, the gas lamps bleed yellow into the fog. Inej follows Kaz south along Gerringcanal.

“We’re not heading into The Barrel?” Inej asks.

“We’re off to a more collegiate location tonight,” he says.

“I didn’t know you were one for studies,” says Inej.

“I’m studious if there’s kruge to be had.” Kaz gives her a rare grin. A bicyclist passes and Inej shifts closer to Kaz, their hands brushing. She starts and makes to move away, but Kaz grasps her hand, the cool leather smoothing over her palm.

_I’m leaving at dawn._

Inej thinks about little pleasures. A dry blanket. The acid and tang of an orange slice. Scraps of waking dreams where he says her name.

_He’s here, he’s with you now._

Time slips under her feet, a tricky thing. She’s anticipating departure.

Inej realizes she has rarely ever done this. Walked next to him down the street. She is used to being his shadow, tracking his path from along the rooftops. Scouting for incoming trouble. This feels…maybe what normal feels like. Maybe what two people do when they’re out in Ketterdam and they’re young, the night even younger.

The buildings of the University District loom out of the fog, sandstone and grey with domed roofs, walls turned pale green from lichen. Kaz turns up a narrow twist of a street heading northeast.

They come to the green quadrangle at the heart of the University and walk across to the white colonnades of the library. Kaz skirts around to the side, to small door, and raps twice with his cane.

“What business?” A muffled voice comes from behind it.

“Late night study,” Kaz replies, giving Inej a wink.

The door cracks open. A boy stands at the other side of the door, all tight boxy shoulders and darting grey eyes. “The old crow is back,” he says, and spits into a bucket next to him. He’s got book held in one hand like a bat.

“Evening Vamp,” says Kaz, stepping over the threshold and shaking the condensation off his blazer. “New book?”

“It’s on botanical reproduction,” he says. Vamp wipes his nose and eyes Inej. “Who’s the bird?”

“She’s with me,” Kaz says, eyes scanning around the vestibule. Vamp raises his brows and grunts in response.

“Follow me,” he says, and they go down a set of stairs and turn through an archway into the heart of the library, illuminated by a dying fire and moonlight filtering through the high windows. Vamp walks over to a bookshelf and slips his hand behind the books. The shelf cracks open and Kaz pushes it wider, revealing a narrow winding staircase. They descend a couple stories until they reach a vaulted passageway illuminated by sconces. Sound echoes mute and watery off the walls.

“It’s a good night boss, this one,” says Vamp, his book tucked under his arm. A thug and a schoolboy all at the same time. “Pigeons flocking, I think it’s the new band.”

They reach the end of the passage and Vamp pulls aside a velvet curtain with a small flourish. The first assault on Inej’s senses is the sweet-sour smell of gin, the burnt ends of cigarettes. Then the brassy trumpet of music, the thump of timpani running through her. Inej steps out onto a narrow balcony overlooking a barrel-ceilinged reading room lined on two levels with books. The floor is packed with people dancing, glasses held aloft, heads tipping back with laughter. The balcony is less packed but still populated. Couples necking in the dark corners, groups of friends smoking and chatting.

Kaz mutters thanks to Vamp and passes some kruge into his hand before walking out onto the balcony behind Inej.

“Welcome to The Reading Room,” says Kaz. The noise is so loud he leans in behind her to hear.

“What is this place?” She turns and realizes he’s close. Very close.

“The long-lost banned book section of the library.” His eyes dart to her mouth. Inej swallows.

“How’d you find it?”

“A couple professors tired of drinking water,” Kaz says. He moves away and leans his forearms against the bannister of the balcony, looking over the crowd.

“Are you going down?”

Kaz shakes his head. Of course not. The press of bodies, the heat. It’s too much. He drinks in the scene though, the noise, the dancing.

“I’ll get us something,” says Inej. She winds down the staircase into the mass of bodies, slinking her way to the bar. The music fades and a new song picks up.

Its rhythm, the first five notes, hit her right in the gut. A Suli song. They crowd begins moving, shimmying, some feet light and some feet sloppy. It’s hot and smells like sweat and liquor.

A voice comes up behind her, “You know this jig?” Inej turns and nods dumbly at two drunken patrons, smiling like fools.

“Oi, she knows this one!” She’s pulled into a circle that’s cleared in the middle of the dance floor, a group with their hands held, and they spin around, legs kicking. A farcical, drunken imitation of a Suli dance. But her throat tightens all the same. Inej is nudged into the center of the circle where two others are dancing. She hears the shimmering of the tambourine.

One of the dancing girls, from a certain angle, looks like Nina. The curves, the hair. She turns and the moment passes. It’s a stranger, a beautiful, laughing girl. But Nina’s voice lingers.

_Dance, you fool._

Inej shakes back her hair. The circle around her spins faster, dizzying, the crowd whoops. And she turns and faces him and swings her hips with each beat of the drums, chin tilted up, lifting her arms and gesturing toward him up on the balcony as if tugging on a line. The floor goes mad.

_Watch me while you can, Brekker. Before I disappear._

She dances. The Reading Room reaches a feverish pitch. Someone passes her the tambourine. Inej moves and the circle careens around her. Her and the others in the circle spin around each other.

Kaz remains sphinx-like, dark eyes trained on her from the balcony, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

Eventually, the song ends. Inej’s heart races like she just walked the tight rope. Somehow, Kaz has already tipped off the bartender and two drinks are waiting for her at the counter in sweating glasses.

She makes it back up the staircase to Kaz and hands him his glass before taking a generous sip of her own.

“A Suli song,” says Inej, still a little breathless. She’s hot, too hot. She tips her neck to the side and puts the cool glass against her skin.

“I enjoyed it,” Kaz says. Nothing about his gaze makes her feel any cooler. She can’t remember Kaz ever saying he enjoyed anything. He takes a sip from his drink, eyes flicking down to the glass on her exposed neck.

She looks at the scar on his lip. Inej wonders if he’s ever kissed anybody. If he’s kissed anything other than the blade of a knife. Something about the gin and ice and hot and her tongue feels loose.

“You should dance with me next time,” she says with a cat-like smile.

“I don’t dance,” he says.

“You’d dance with me,” she asserts. Kaz doesn’t protest.

* * *

The Ketterdam clock tower chimes three o’clock in the morning.

Witching hour, when the Saints leave and the spirits come out to dance. They’re back in Kaz’s room now, and have been catching up for the better part of the last two hours.

Inej stands. “I have to go.”

Kaz tips back the rest of his drink and sets it on the desk. “When will you be back?” His voice is so soft, she barely hears him over the dying of the last, low chime.

Inej turns from the window and looks at him. His forearms rest against his thighs, ungloved hands now shuffling through his favorite deck of cards.

“I’m heading to Shriftport next, then to Weddle and Leflir. Saints-willing we will be able to complete the journey within the year.”

Kaz hums, a low noise in the back of his throat. The cards continue to flow between his hands, shuffling and reshuffling their fates.

“A safe journey, I hope?” His voice is casual.

“It should be, we’ll time our passage with the good weather.” Inej watches the cards waterfall and gather. They slip over each other, a susurration, and she remembers the hiss of the wind during a storm.

_Snap of rigging against the mast, heeling starboard from the waves, and the slice of lightning through an indigo sky._

“Ghezen’s speed to you,” Kaz says. He isn’t looking at her.

_The taste of salt and ozone in the air. The world sliding sideways and the boards slick. The Wraith slipping over a heaving world._

Inej is walking over to his chair, moving into the space between his legs.

Kaz flips a card over. The Joker. Shuffle again. He flicks out another card between his fingers. Queen of Hearts.

_The groaning of the wood, the cries of her crew. The cracking of the hull._

Shuffle again. Ace of spades. Shuffle. Four of spades.

“I w—“ his voice cuts off and his eyelashes flicker once. He looks up at her.

_Rope burning between her hands, her stomach in her throat. No roof to walk across, no pipe to shimmy down. Just this thrashing sea, this emptying sky._

“I—“ he chokes. His chest rises and falls.

Three of clubs. Shuffle. Ten of diamonds.

_She prayed to all the Saints and to the sea and to the shore. And she prayed for him too. Dirtyhands, magic hands, boy with the dark stone eyes._

His hands shake. The cards spill onto the floor, a mess of black and red. They slip into the cracks between the floorboards.

“Kaz.” Inej’s voice is a bullet.

And suddenly his hands are gripping onto her hips, anchoring there, his forehead resting against her stomach. Kaz shudders, his breath ragged.

She doesn’t move.

“I—“

“Kaz—“

“Please.” Kaz rasps into her and she feels her knees giving. He rises to his feet, his hands still fixed on her hips and his gaze like dark pools. He walks her backwards until she feels the wall behind her.

Kaz whispers something as he leans down toward her, and she can’t tell if he’s talking to her or himself. He repeats it again, a soft, low mantra, an invocation into the curve of her neck, and his mouth brushes over the pulse beating there. He pauses and his hands slide up over her hips to her waist. Inej’s eyes flutter shut and she tilts her head back against the wall. The world turns silent but for her pulse, his breathing. He kisses across her throat, his thumbs on her waist. He kisses under her jaw.

“Inej,” he breathes into her skin. She shudders. He smells like cinnamon and gin.

He charts a course from under her jaw to the sensitive skin behind her ear. A hand comes up and draws across her clavicles, another smoothes across the inside of her wrist, his thumb at the base of her throat, fingers dragging up the side of her forearm…

He draws back.

Inej opens her eyes. He’s removed his hands and placed them on the wall on either side of her, eyes closed, heart racing.

“Talk to me,” she says.

_Please._

“A widow’s walk,” Kaz scrapes out. He opens his eyes and stares at her, then her mouth, a sea, devouring.

_Wait for me._

“I built one. On the top of the Slat. I sit up there sometimes like a young bride searching for her lost mercher.” Kaz lets out a laugh that gets stuck. Inej tracks the bobbing of his throat.

“I’m here now.” She raises a hand at her side and pauses, a question. Kaz doesn’t move, only watches. She moves her hand over to his neck and begins to loosen his tie, and it slips to the floor. His heart drums under her hand. She unbuttons the top of his shirt, three buttons, revealing a pale triangle of skin, one scar. She leans forward and kisses the base of his throat. He sways.

_Dance with me._

Three more buttons, a kiss, eyelashes skating over skin. A pale pink flush colors Kaz’s chest like a sunrise. Buttons undone to halfway down his sternum. Inej places her hands on the skin of his chest and smoothes them down to his stomach. He lets out a small sound. A hitch in his throat.

_Too much._

His hands find hers and he pulls them away. Inej is aching.

But then his arms are around her, she’s gathered to his chest, her head cradled in his hand, tangled in her hair.

“I’ll be here,” Kaz murmurs.

_Come back to me._

They stay holding onto each other for a little while longer.

**Author's Note:**

> this is part of my series of I-wrote-this-years-ago-but-am-posting-it-now uploads because it's quarantine and i figured i may as well publish things lol. 
> 
> hope you all are staying healthy and safe during this time <3


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